Discover South Iceland Highland
Glaciers – Volcanoes – Mountains – Waterfalls – Thermal Pools

News

Eyjafjallajökull eruption

Friday, Mar 05 2010

Our closest glacier, Eyjafjallajökull, seems very active and has had experienced hundreds of underground tremors for the past 36 hours. Many geologists believe an eruption - albeit a smaller on, could be coming up soon and they were right. Saturday March 21 it did happen.

The icecap of the glacier covers a volcano (1,666 m in height) which has erupted relatively frequently since the Ice Age. The last eruption was from 1821 to 1823, causing a fatal glacier run. The crater of the volcano has a diameter of 3–4 km and the glacier covers an area of about 100 km².

The south end of the mountain was once part of the Atlantic coastline. As the sea has since retreated some 5 km, the former coastline has left behind sheer cliffs with a multitude of beautiful waterfalls, the best known of them being Skógafoss. In strong winds, the water of the smaller falls can even be blown up the mountain. We hope to expect to see the northern lights above the red lit volcano under the thundering Skoarfoss waterfall within the next 2 weeks. That would be naure at its finest.

Back

Print | Tell a friend